This week’s mystery movie has been the 1939 Paramount picture “The Cat and the Canary,” and yes, we did the 1927 version as a mystery movie in March. With Bob Hope, Paulette Goddard, John Beal, Douglass Montgomery, Gale Sondergaard, Elizabeth Patterson, George Zucco, Nydia Westman and John Wray. The screenplay was by Walter DeLeon and Lynn Starling from the play by John Willard. Photography was by Charles Lang, art direction by Hans Dreier and Robert Usher, costumes by Edith Head, music by Ernst Toch, Andrea Setaro musical advisor, and interior decorations by A.E. Freudeman. The producer was Arthur Hornblow Jr. and the director was Elliott Nugent.

Since mystery melodramas laid in old dark houses are mostly nonsense anyway, Paramount has had the wit and wisdom to produce a nonsense edition of John Willard’s old shocker, “The Cat and the Canary.” Streamlined, screamlined and played to the hilt for comedy, the new version is more harebrained than hair-raising, which is at it should be.

(Note: The New York Times recently moved its archive of film reviews behind the Times Machine paywall and makes them hard to find. Searches for “The Cat and the Canary” using the title, the names of the stars and the name of the director came up empty. The only way to locate this review was to go page by page. Not good, New York Times, not good at all.)

For Monday, we have two mystery gents. The fellow on the left, alas, has been cropped out due to his lack of mysteriousness, but we will see him later in the week.

52 Responses to Movieland Mystery Photo (Updated + + + +)

An interesting guess, but alas, I’m afraid not. “It Happened One Night” is one of those pictures that I don’t think I could ever pull off as a mystery movie. Like “The Wizard of Oz” or “Casablanca.” Just too well known.